Growing Up
by Guardian of the Nakano
Summary: Sakura always knew that one day she'd have to let go of her childhood. It is raining. One-shot. Short.


Sakura always knew that one day, she would have to let her childhood go.

She didn't know when.

She didn't know why.

She didn't even know how.

She just knew she'd have to let go of her salad days and subject herself to life and realities discontentments. She would do so with resentment, she guessed, but vowed anyways to hang on to her childhood for as long as she could. She vowed to love every day of being three feet tall, every sniffle of a cold, every scrape on her knee from running after friends or running away from problems.

She wanted to love it all.

And her black flats clicked against the wet pavement as she walked down the paved, raining streets of her home village. The streets she would persue her mother with as she clung to the hand of that gentle woman and glanced curiously at the multicolored fruits and vegetable displays, the pretty kimono that hung under the roof of the stall, the welcoming stands of dango and ramen. The streets that she followed the boy she loved on. The one with long hair and pretty eyelashes. The ones that she cried on when she hid behind the corner and saw her long-haired, one-day husband with another _boy_. The ones that her heart fluttered on when she persued her new love, the boy with messy, spiky black hair and pale skin in the sunlight, the younger brother of her first broken heart. The ones she smiled on when she made her first friend, a proud blonde girl with piercing blue eyes and enough personality for the both of them. The streets that she broke her heart on when her lover left her behind forever, taking the more rational part of her brain with her as she vowed to love him forever.

Now the rain was pouring profusely, making her feel very, very cold inside. Her pink checked scarf was bunched around her long, pale neck, her bright pink hair in a loose bun. Her black sweater was thick and warm, but did nothing to keep out the cold inside. She felt years and years worth of tears spinning calmly in her stomach, laying a gentle, white hand against her abdomen. A chill went down her spine without imposing itself, staying for a short moment before leaving her behind as well. She stopped walking, instead looking down at the wet pavement as light raindrops bounced off of the puddles, the reflection of her knees, the ones that were now covered in pink nylon leggings, the ones that used to be scraped and scratched from falling over herself in the clumbsy idleness of a lovely childhood spent too fast mirrored back at her. The trim of her black skirt barely made itself known in such an image and she chose to continue walking, her black flats clicking wetly after stepping through the puddle without a second thought. She walked, a bouquet of multicolored nylon balloons clutched in her right palm, her other hand swaying gently as she walked, calmly. The pattering of the rain on the street seemed to chill her heart, a light, delicate wind bristling the hairs against the nape of her waxen neck, making her look up suddenly. With a light gasp, she noticed the boy had released his childhood a long time ago, now standing at the opening of an alley cooly, his hand held out to Sakura in a beckoning way, a gentle smile on his pale pink lips.

Her shiny black flats were now Mary Janes as she sped up, running towards her vow as she breathed out crystalline clouds of need, shoulders working, balloons trailing behind her, bouncing gently.

The boy stood, waiting patiently, that smile never waning, that hand never falling. Her heart never failing to race at the sight of him. She reached out, too, her hand extended to take his. Almost there...

She stopped. Sasuke wasn't there. The rain was padding lightly on the pavement. The balloons drifted calmly beside her. Her heart froze. She closed her eyes.

Sakura opened her eyes again, the empty streets stretching out behind her, in front of her, beside her, the rain and those balloons her only company. She glanced up at them absently, noticing they were bobbing lightly in the rain. She reached her free hand into her coat pocket, taking out a marker. She brought the floating spheres of color down beside her, uncapping the marker. She began to write on each one.

All of her favorite things went on to a seperate balloon. Everything she loved as a child was marked on the shining orbs, glimmering with color, the most for miles in the rainy city. The gutters rumbled with the flowing water. The tins of the garbage cans in the alley rumbled loudly, thudding rhythmically. A cardboard box was assaulted by the rain. On the last balloon, she wrote _Sasuke_.

Closing her eyes with resolution, Sakura's heart panged longingly. She clenched her jaw a bit, tying one end of her heart to those balloons, and opened her fist, letting them fly off into the stormy, grey sky as a raindrop fell from her eyelash. She turned her green irises to the sky to watch the balloons drift away slowly, dispersing into the air, never to return.

She felt very, very cold in her arms. She inhaled deeply and began on her way home.


End file.
